Twisted Root First Impression
Tried the new Twisted Root on Burnet Road, which took over the old Hilbert’s spot. It’s only been open a couple of days. Still some construction work going on outside, but the rest seems “done”. Overall, not that impressed. They only have one size of burger–giant. It’s 8oz, half a pound. In my younger days, that was fine. These days, prefer smaller patties. There should be an option at least for something smaller, but that’s the only choice. Also no kid burgers, so if your kid wants a burger, they get a half-pound burger. Burger tasted fine, was cooked well with pink interior, but wasn’t anything mind-blowing. Fries very sub-par–seasoning-salt-doused frozen fries. Shake machine broken, which we can chalk up to opening hiccups.
The other annoying feature is that after you order, they hand you a celebrity name as your order name that they will call when your food is ready. And when that moment arrives, the person at the mic attempts to regale the helpless diners by making some bad jokes and impersonations related to the name they gave you. E.g., we got Monty Python, so the guy calling our order said something non-funny in a British accent, then called out the name “Monty Python”. This got very annoying very quickly, as we got to listen to numerous bad puns, bad singing (eg Bob Marley), bad jokes about Michael Jackson, Kim Kardashian, etc. Seems like a cute idea on the surface, but after 45 minutes of listening to bad jokes and impersonations over the loudspeaker every minute or so (they were pretty busy, so orders were coming up fast), it got old. Any conversation you are having at your table has to stop while the bad jokes blare.
Overall pretty disappointing. Forgot to take pix…. 😐
Sam Lander 5:43 pm on May 1, 2015 Permalink |
Hey, ABN, thanks for the good, reliable reviews. I really look forward to your reviews of In-N-Out, Burger Fi, Five Guys, and others! I know you’re oriented toward north Austin, but for your consideration you might undertake to review Jim’s burgers (Rob Balon swears by them FWIW), Evangeline Cafe (good roadside East Texas/Western Louisiana greasy burger), Magnolia Cafe, Spec’s, Short Stop, or even maybe the Big Ass Burger at Roaring Fork downtown. Now that I think of it there are also Sandy’s at Barton Springs and Dirty’s on the drag. In any event thanks for the good work!
Sam Lander 5:45 pm on May 1, 2015 Permalink |
I forgot to add Jack Allen’s kitchen, where they drive a steak knife through the burger when they serve it.